


I've Got You

by imgoingtocrash



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Gen, Nightmares, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker Whump, Post-Spider-Man: Homecoming, Pre-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Trauma, Whump, waking nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:14:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26621968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imgoingtocrash/pseuds/imgoingtocrash
Summary: It’s two AM, and Tony finds Peter lying prone on the wet concrete of an alleyway just north of Hell’s Kitchen.It’s not Peter’s normal turf, but Twitter has been blowing up for the past hour about some kind of fight between Spidey and some new mutant baddie, and this is apparently where it ended.Ever since Peter declined a position with the Avengers, he’s been communicating with Tony more, calling and reporting things he suspects might be out of his league. Sometimes, though, if a guy with a scorpion tail and a grudge targets you specifically as your alter-ego…well, there’s not much to do but fight him off, Tony supposes.Scorpion comes after Spider-Man. His sting brings back old, traumatizing memories for Peter. Tony does his best to help.
Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 12
Kudos: 71
Collections: The Friendly Neighborhood Exchange





	I've Got You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Peer_Parker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Peer_Parker/gifts).



> Hey everyone! This fic is for peer_parker (peer-parker on tumblr) for the 3rd Friendly Neighborhood Exchange! The prompt I chose was “Tony comforts Peter after a nightmare,” but since I was given permission to get whumpy and angsty with it, I went a less traditional direction. Hopefully that’s okay. ;)

It’s two AM, and Tony finds Peter lying prone on the wet concrete of an alleyway just north of Hell’s Kitchen.

It’s not Peter’s normal turf, but Twitter has been blowing up for the past hour about some kind of fight between Spidey and some new mutant baddie, and this is apparently where it ended.

Ever since Peter declined a position with the Avengers, he’s been communicating with Tony more, calling and reporting things he suspects might be out of his league. Sometimes, though, if a guy with a scorpion tail and a grudge targets you specifically as your alter-ego…well, there’s not much to do but fight him off, Tony supposes.

He can admit that he’s worried. Peter communicating more also means that Tony himself has become more involved. Sometimes it just means making sure the kid has a place to tend to wounds instead of using his aunt’s first aid kit, but other times it’s a lot simpler, a lot more… _personal_.

Okay, fine, so he likes the kid. Like, really genuinely doesn’t mind Peter’s presence in his personal lab, and Tony gave Peter a desk of his own, and he could listen to Peter ramble on for hours about chemistry and _Star Wars_ and school or whatever the hell as long as he’s having a good time.

Because of all that, seeing Peter collapsed against the ground makes his heart pound in that too-fast way that makes him remember when the Arc Reactor was the only thing keeping his heartbeats regulated.

Tony shakes his head, correcting his thoughts. The thing about being around an impressionable young adult is that you have to at least pretend to have your shit together, even when everything is falling apart and you also have no idea what’s going to happen next. Tony has to be calm for Peter, or the kid will freak out and possibly injure himself more than he already might be.

Tony spreads out his hands to descend fully to the ground, but Peter doesn’t physically respond to Tony landing in his armor next to him just like he didn’t verbally respond to any of Tony’s multiple calls over the comms. Karen had reported Peter’s vitals when asked, but that's about all he's got until he can see under Peter's suit for himself.

Tony assumes the kid must be unconscious, at first, but when he pulls back Peter’s mask he finds the kid’s eyes dilated to hell—wide and out of focus and stuck looking somewhere next to Tony’s head. Accompanying that is a sheen of sweat on Peter’s skin, sticky and matting Peter’s curls into wild angles.

“Pete?” Tony calls, holding Peter’s head between his hands, attempting to get his attention. If Peter’s awake, he can tell Tony enough to be helpful. “Hey, it’s me. It’s Tony. Are you okay?”

It seems like a stupid question, now that Tony has the mask off. Peter’s breathing hard, short, tight gasps like something is damaged. Something possibly internal. If he fell on the ground, they might even be looking at a concussion.

“You better not projectile vomit on me,” Tony jokes breathily as he tilts up Peter’s head by the chin. He’s aiming for levity to ease the anxious part of his mind that won’t move away from the possible severity of the situation.

"M'here," Peter finally replies with a slur, looking in Tony's direction but not actually seeming to focus anywhere close to his faceplate.

It’s not the, _No, really, Mister Stark, I'm all good! Totally fine!_ that Tony was expecting, but he'll take groggily conscious over knocked out cold for the moment.

"Yeah, you sure are,” Tony replies back, semi-thankful that Peter can’t see under the faceplate at the moment, can’t see the way Tony’s sure his worry is leaking out of his facial features. “Far from Queens, I might add." 

Tony doesn't mean to sound accusatory, but part of him always worries about Peter’s actual capabilities versus the confident way Peter seems to believe he can handle whatever is thrown in his direction at only sixteen years old.

He's gotten to know Peter better, and he really does trust Peter to take care of himself in a fight, but Tony also knows the ranges of crazy other costumed freaks can be, and he'd much rather Peter stick to robberies and drug busts until he's had a bit more practice than his ex-not-girlfriend's dad.

Peter sluggishly quirks an eyebrow in question, like until this moment he didn't realize this alleyway _wasn't_ in Queens, but then slowly nods to himself.

"Guy was crazy, Mister Stark," Peter pauses, drunkenly smiling to himself. Definitely not lucid, though the cause is still up in the air. “Though he worked for the Bugle, so that tracks."

"They really can't get enough of you, huh?" Tony remarks. The publication is sponsored by a known, vocal anti-hero CEO. Spider-Man not officially being an Avenger only seems to make their articles of him ten times more critical.

Tony stays squatted close to the ground, running a hand gently over Peter’s head and finding no noticeable lumps or bumps. No concussion, then, hopefully. Maybe some kind of drugs? Poison? Definitely not _great_ , but it would explain the lack of focus and slightly garbled speech.

Tony rocks his weight back onto his heels, staying squatted next to Peter’s form.

"Alright, Pete, let's get into it—what are we looking at here?"

Peter furrows his brow.

"I dunno. His tail was allllll…" Peter drifts abruptly in a slur of the final word, never finishing the thought. "A spider stung by a scorpion. That's ironic."

"It's not, actually," Tony sighs. Only Peter would try to joke while being infected with god knows what.

Right, it was a _mutant_ bad guy of some kind. If Peter was stung, who knows what he was injected with. It could be some kind of home-baked chemical agent or something biologically secreted…god, where are the days of other guys in mechanical suits? This magical mutant space mumbo-jumbo is getting way out of their leagues.

At least Peter doesn’t seem to be in mortal danger, as is the state Tony prefers of his Spider-mentee.

"Peter, this is important, okay? Focus up." He taps Peter's chin, keeping the kid's eyes straight for him. "Other than being possibly drugged to the gills, are you okay? I don’t want to fly you to the medbay with internal injuries."

“Mmmm…” Peter's eyes fall shut with a few slow blinks. Assessing? Or off in his own head and completely ignoring the one person trying to help him?

“Peter?" Tony asks, snapping a finger next to the kid’s ear. Nothing. He moves his fingers down to his pulse point, thankful to feel it despite Karen’s readings on his HUD that confirm Peter’s heart is still steadily beating.

Then, like he’s possessed by some unknown force, Peter snaps his head up, his too-big eyes darting around like he’s forgotten the entirety of their conversation about where he is.

He grunts and gasps in pained little bursts. Tony watches his pulse increase, jumping from a relaxed, low 60 BPM to over 100 within seconds.

“Peter, what—kid, what is it, what’s wrong?” Tony asks, half reaching out for Peter and equally afraid that he’s going to break Peter just by touching him.

“I can’t move,” Peter gasps, snapping up in some kind of half-crunch before falling back and grappling at Tony’s hands weakly. “I’m stuck.”

"You're—?" Tony's mask allows him to see perfectly even in the dark of night, and nothing is holding Peter down as far as he can tell.

He considers that the kid’s sticky powers may have gone haywire as a response to whatever's in his system, but when he pulls on Peter’s hand, it follows his grip into the air, then drops right back to the ground like a wet noodle.

“Peter, if you’re hurt, just tell me what it is. I can get a private ambulance down here in—“

“No. Nonono. Oh, god, no.” Peter twitches his limbs a little, but doesn’t actually move from his spot on the ground. “Not again, not again, no, please. Please!”

“Peter,” Tony tries again, shaking at Peter’s shoulders. Not again? What the hell is he talking about, not again? “Pete, snap out of it, just tell me what’s wrong. You’re freaking me out here.”

“Please, I’m down here,” Peter pleads to the air, like Tony isn’t even sitting next to him, isn’t speaking to him. Tears fall down his cheeks, mixing with the sweat and grime on his skin. “M’gonna die down here.”

Peter sounds utterly defeated. His head lolls, but Tony catches him with an arm behind his neck. He’s practically cradling Peter at this point, but Peter isn’t reacting in the slightest, clenching his muscles but ultimately not protesting as Tony bundles Peter’s limbs closer.

Whatever substance infected Peter must also be changing whatever he’s experiencing that Tony can’t seem to snap him out of. That’s the only thing he can think of—disassociation, maybe some kind of nightmare scenario that was triggered when he passed out?

"Peter, you're not stuck," Tony insists with another gentle shake to Peter's limbs. "Come on, wake up.”

"Help me!" Peter shouts, this time louder. "Please, somebody, I'm down here!"

Tony attempts to shush Peter, shaking him again while he does it. Or maybe it’s more like rocking. That's a thing, right? Rocking motions are comforting to kids? Or is that just babies?

He doesn’t want Peter to be so distressed, but Peter isn’t listening to him, and the last thing they need is curious neighbors investigating why a child is crying for help at two in the morning in an alley.

“It's okay, Pete,” Tony attempts to soothe, even if the kid doesn't seem to react at all to the fact that Tony is about to pick Peter completely off of the ground and into the arms of his suit. "I gotcha. No dying. Not with me, alright?"

If Peter’s been dosed with an unknown toxin, he needs to get it identified before it does some kind of unexpected permanent damage. The sooner they leave, the better, even if he jostles some kind of injury on the way that Peter wasn't lucid enough to mention.

Peter's body lifts from the ground like dead weight, his limbs awkward and stiff since they're not hanging on properly to Tony's suit.

Peter whimpers, and instinctively Tony attempts to adjust his hold. It doesn't seem to make a difference. If Peter has injuries, anything Tony is doing isn't aggravating them.

"I won't drop you," Tony assures, mostly confident that he's telling the truth. "You hear me, Peter? I've got you. We'll get you looked at soon. You're safe."

Like it's in opposition to Tony's words, Peter sobs out, "Mister Stark was right."

Tony has selfishly wanted to hear those words from Peter on multiple occasions: _Yes, Mister Stark, you were right, I should have asked for help with my suit instead of getting myself electrocuted. Oh boy, Mister Stark, you were right when you said some villains are above my pay grade. You were right, Mister Stark, I should have listened to you hours ago when you said I needed to eat something to fulfill my enhanced metabolism's needs._

Tony has a feeling he's not going to like whatever he was finally right about in Peter's eyes right now.

“I wasn’t ready," Peter admits, eking the words into Tony's shoulder like something hard is crushing against his windpipe. "And I—I’m gonna die down here. Aunt May is gonna have to bury me just like she buried Ben.”

Tony feels a boulder—old and worn and heartbreakingly familiar—settle in his gut. How many times did he imagine Pepper burying him, losing him? The weight of knowing what you mean to other people sits heavy on the shoulders of men—of a child—just trying to do the right thing. The brave, honorable, painful, heartbreaking thing that being a hero is.

And as it turns out…Peter means a lot to him too. Imagining any scenario where Peter Parker ends up dying alone and scared—let alone at all—is scaring the crap out of him.

“Peter," Tony breathes out, unsure what he can say in this moment, what he can ever say to make up for supporting Peter in this, for helping Peter put himself in danger. “Stop, okay? Just—you’re gonna be fine, buddy. You’re fine.”

Those are all lies Tony is telling himself because he can’t accept another outcome. He has to make this okay, because he can’t just sit and watch that crushed, defeated look on Peter’s face without trying to fix it.

Peter gives a sardonic little chuckle, loopy and pained at the same time. “She won’t even have to bury me, cause—cause I’m already down here. Just like Toomes wanted. M’so…so stupid.”

Toomes.

If Peter’s seeing things, then Toomes means Peter’s seeing— _that_ night, Jesus.

Peter told him that Toomes crashed a building on his head. Tony always suspected there was more to it—one doesn't just crawl out of the remnants of concrete without a struggle—but Peter had brushed Tony off, and he'd let it go because Peter acted like it was no big deal.

This is definitely a big deal.

This is _again_ , this is a nightmare Peter’s had before, this is trauma rolling around in a sixteen-year-old kid’s head when he closes his eyes. It’s Tony’s failures, Tony’s mistakes, Tony’s fault.

"Peter, you're not trapped. You're not," Tony pleads. Maybe if he can snap Peter out of it...he doesn't know, but he has to try. He can't just let Peter suffer in his own personal hellscape. He knows exactly what kind of damage nightmares can do to you.

"Feel the wind, Peter. We're flying home. You're in the sky. A far cry from being trapped underground. You’re not down there anymore.” Peter's eyes are still glassy, but for just a second, one of his eyeballs tilts toward Tony.

"Peter, can you hear me?” Tony allows his faceplate to lift despite the winds around them, hoping to catch Peter’s eyes again and bring him back to reality.

Peter suddenly squirms in his arms, forcing Tony to adjust his grip to avoid splatting Queens' favorite hero all over the pavement.

"Mister Stark, Mister—I'm here, I'm down here! Please, help me, please!” Peter yells over the rush of the wind as they continue to fly towards Stark Tower.

Okay, so still in his head, but receptive to Tony at the moment. They can work with that. That’s good.

"You have to stay still, okay Peter? Just stay still. Um, I’m—I'm right here, just wait."

"Mister Stark, I'm sorry," Peter stops his frantic movement, but another tear falls from his eyes. "I'm sorry I didn't listen, I'll do better, I'll—I'll be good. Please just get me out, please!"

Tony is used to Peter's unflappable confidence. This is desperation and begging and pure fear.

Peter is already so good, so much better than Tony has ever been.

"Nothing to be sorry for," Tony replies, swallowing back what might or might not be something teary. "You just got a little in over your head—literally.” He cringes at his old habits—not the right time to alleviate things with humor.

“Sorry that was bad, I just—I shouldn't have yelled at you back then. It wasn't a teaching moment, I was just pissed and I took it out on an impressionable kid. I shouldn’t have taken your suit. It was a mistake. I’m sorry.”

Tony knows better now, that Peter's respect is something he earns by really teaching him and mentoring him hands-on like he's supposed to rather than just making choices for the kid and expecting him to listen because Tony is the adult.

"You don't have to worry about that stuff anymore, Pete. We're past that. Way past. I trust you, and I've got your back, even when you mess up." He looks at Peter's watery eyes, brown and burst wide open and pleading into a darkness Tony apparently has little light to get through. "Even when you don't know it, Pete. I've got you. I'm here."

And maybe it's a little too soft, a little too honest, but it gets lost in the air around them, and apparently, to Peter as well.

"Please," Peter pleads, unknowingly tucking his face deeper into the juncture of metal and skin at Tony's neck, wetting him with Peter’s tears. He shivers when Peter’s warm breath pants out a quiet admittance. "I'm scared."

“It’s okay, Peter,” is all Tony can think to say.

He wasn’t there when it counted, before. He didn’t know what was happening to Peter, and he probably was too pissed to really care. Now, though, he does care. Even when he’s mad, disappointed, distracted by a million and one other things.

Tony cares about Peter, and he’s not going to let Peter forget that he has Tony’s support, even when the young hero is at his weakest.

“I’ve got you.”

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was supposed to be something else—a whole thing with multiple nightmare scenarios and such. But I committed to this exchange, and then had weeks of non-stop work. Which is like, yay, I’m making money during COVID and I love my job!!! But also it means I was in panic mode REAL HARD when I realized this fic needed to be done and the original idea was in no state to be finished. So, thank you to savvysass, who dug me out of my distress and gave me enough ideas to make this fic happen on time and become something different (and actually, much better).
> 
> All to say: I hope you like what it became, peer_parker! I wish I could have done more, but I hope you’ll accept what I had time for (and maybe, if I ever get time off, I’ll think of more and do something in the vein of finishing that original idea. So you’ll get, like, bonus gifts, maybe. _She said, looking at her already long WIP/ideas pile._ )
> 
> All comments, kudos, etc. are, as always, appreciated! Also, remember to check out the other fics from this exchange, including the ones from the last 2 exchanges (which I also participated in, wink wink).


End file.
